24 November 2010

Nope, I didn’t get a new oven just finally went to get an oven thermometer after a couple of my friends telling me I should. And I wished I’ve listened to them earlier, because now I know why my cakes always doesn’t turned out right; they would be either burnt or undercooked. To my horror I thought all this while (ok it’s pretty much a guesswork when it comes to my oven) I’m baking at the ‘right’ temperature but turns out it’s not! 170 degrees Celsius supposedly turns out to be 200 degrees Celsius!

06 November 2010

I love chicken wings, especially grilled or fried ones. Yummy, succulent wings. Mmmmmm. So the other day while cleaning up my pantry I found some chopped almonds, I bought it a while back thinking I might use it for baking but never got around to it. So before they turned bad, I thought of making almond crusted chicken wings instead of just the usual baked ones, not sure if it’s going to taste nice. But now I have another recipe added to my chicken wings collection.

03 November 2010

It has been so hot for the past few weeks that when it was breezy and cloudy last Sunday, we decided to stay indoors instead of hitting the malls. And of course, eating out is getting costlier these days as well especially for meals like these when you can easily make them yourself at home at home.

And of course, what’s breakfast without fluffy,yummy pancakes eh?Oh and not forgetting the lil chef

All these while I have been searching high and low on how to make pancakes light and fluffy, I’d would follow the recipe to the T, tweaked it but still the pancakes will always turn out flat and slightly hard. Unlike the fluffy ones you eat at cafes or restaurants until I was beginning to think it’s a secret that everyone but me knows of. So one day by chance, I finally found the secret!And it’s thanks to the months of whisking my eggs whites/yolks/whole into pale, creamy and fluffy texture, I out of habit did the same when I was making pancakes, I beat the egg until it’s pale and light, sifted the flour over the wet ingredients and left the mixture to sit while I clean up and voila I got myself fluffy pancakes! Erm, I better start using other adjectives aside from fluffy. Anyway here’s the recipe for the pancakes and since it’s a lovely Sunday morning, I made garlic butter too. So double recipes in today’s post.Yaay!

Buttermilk Pancakes

(Adapted from Joy of Baking)You don’t have to use buttermilk but I stumbled upon it the other day while grocery shopping and got it to see what’s the hoo-haa using buttermilk in cooking and so far I’m impressed

1. In a large bowl, whisk the egg like how you usually do for sponge cakes until light and fluffy. Next beat in the honey along with the vanilla essence.

2. Sift the flour, salt, baking powder and soda over the egg and honey mixture. Mix well before beating in the butter and buttermilk.

3. I know some recipes said you shouldn’t over-mix the batter but in my case, I did and the batter will form a slow ribbon when I raised my whisk.

4. Let the batter sit for for 10-20 minutes for the chemistry to work (Baking soda reacts to honey and also buttermilk causing the batter to have bubbles, and this of course makes the pancakes light and fluffy*again!* )

5. While waiting for the batter to sit, heat a frying pan over medium heat and oil the pan using the extra melted butter.

6. Using a small ladle, pour about 3/4 full ladleful of batter onto the pan. When you see bubbles start to appear on the surface, by this stage the bottoms of the pancakes are already brown, you can flip the pancake over and cook until lightly browned.

7. Repeat until you used up the remaining batter.

8. Best serve HOT with sticky sweet honey (or if you can find maple syrup) and butter or jam.

9. Depending on your ladle, but this recipe makes about 6-8 pancakes.

Cooking Pictorial

Ingredients

How To

And now for the garlic butter, once you start making your own garlic butter you will never buy them anymore. It’s so simple to make and hassle free (well unless you count mincing garlic as troublesome, you can always grate them instead) and home made ones are 100 times so much nicer than store-bought version. I have been snacking on garlic toast nearly every day (that explains why the scales have been tipping over at the wrong side) because it’s so delish!

Garlic Butter250 gram butter at room temperature (I use SCS butter as I find them creamier and more suitable to use to make garlic/herbed butter compared to other brands) 2 bulbs of garlic, minced or grated ( if you find 2 bulbs of garlic is overwhelming you can use 1 bulb instead) 1 tablespoons of dried mixed herbs1/2 teaspoon of ground nutmegsalt to taste

Just mix everything together and there you go. Freshly made garlic butter. Told you it’s easy

p.s I’m trying out another image sharing site, so do let me know if it’s any different or still the same yea while you go through my blog p.p.s And guys I didn’t go through to Round 3 of Project Food Blog but thank you so much for voting for me yea!